UK Taxpayer-funded
Lloyds bank may have "stashed" $9 billion for President Omar
al-Bashir of Sudan, according to Wikileaks cables published in the Guardian today. Lloyds must now
confirm if this is true or not and if it is then the bank must publicly explain
what due diligence checks it has done to ensure that these funds are not the
proceeds of corruption, said Global Witness.

Leaked US embassy
cables state that the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court
(ICC), Luis Moreno-Ocampo, told US officials that he believed that Bashir had a
"stash of money" in "illegal accounts" worth $9 billion. The prosecutor, who
has indicted Bashir for war crimes, reported that "Lloyd's Bank in London might
be holding or knowledgeable of the whereabouts of his money".

"If this
allegation by the ICC prosecutor is accurate, it appears that a UK high street
bank bailed out by the government is holding billions controlled by an indicted
war criminal, or at the very least would be able to help trace any funds" said
Robert Palmer, a campaigner with Global Witness.

Under the UK's
anti-money laundering laws banks are required to check their customers'
identity and their source of funds to ensure that the money they handle is
clean, and the Financial Services Authority is meant to ensure that banks are
doing this. Global Witness has repeatedly called for banks to do more to turn
down suspect funds.

"Maybe Lloyds
knows something about Bashir's and Sudan's finances that we don't, but $9
billion is an extraordinary amount of money for a head of state to control. If
this story is true, I'd like to know what controls Lloyds put in place to
ensure that the funds were legitimate - and I'm sure the Sudanese people would
as well" added Palmer. It is not clear from the cable whether the supposed
accounts are in the name of Bashir personally, a Sudanese state account over
which he has control, or a third party.

The unequal
distribution of wealth was one of the primary drivers of the 22-year civil war
between north and south Sudan in which 1.5 million people died. The
Comprehensive Peace Agreement signed in 2005 splits oil revenues between the
two sides, though southerners have persistently accused Bashir's government in
the north of cheating them out of a significant portion of the money they are
owed. By coincidence, $9 billion is just short of the amount transferred from
north to south in oil revenues since 2005.

A referendum on
potential independence for the south will be held in January and is a source of
immense tension between north and south. Both sides have massed armies
along their border in readiness for renewed conflict.

"If the cable is
true, more than just doing business with an indicted war criminal, Lloyd's
could be in some sense contributing to instability and mistrust in Sudan at the
most fragile moment in its history," warned Palmer.

In January 2009
Lloyds was fined $350 million by the American authorities for disguising the
origins of wire transfers from Sudan as well as Iran and Libya in order to
avoid US sanctions against those countries.

Notes to editors:

1. Global Witness'
September 2009 report, Fuelling Mistrust, raised
significant concerns about the lack of transparency in the oil sharing
agreement between north and south. In October 2010 Global Witness' report International Thief
Thiefrevealed how a number of British banks, including Barclays, Natwest, RBS
and HSBC had accepted millions of pounds from corrupt Nigerian politicians.

2. Lloyds issued
the following statement to the Guardian: "We have absolutely no evidence
to suggest there is any connection between Lloyds Banking Group and Mr Bashir.
The group's policy is to abide by the legal and regulatory obligations in all
jurisdictions in which we operate."